It is hoped that the clouds produced by the "cloud ships" could cancel out the greenhouse effect Ben Webster, Environment Editor, and Hannah Devlin

They sound like ideas from a Jules Verne novel, but giant engineering schemes designed to alter the climate offer the cheapest way of avoiding catastrophic global warming, according to a growing number of scientists and green-minded entrepreneurs.

Most of the schemes have been dismissed as impossibly expensive or impractical, such as the proposal to create a space sunshade by using rockets to deploy millions of mirrors in the stratosphere.

One relatively cheap solution, however, is gaining favour among many different groups and is endorsed today by an independent study that compares the costs and benefits of all the main ideas. A wind-powered fleet of 1,900 ships would criss-cross the oceans, sucking up sea water and spraying it from the top of tall funnels to create vast white clouds.

These clouds would reflect a tiny proportion, between 1 and 2 per cent, of the sunlight that would otherwise warm the ocean. This would be enough to cancel out the greenhouse effect caused by carbon dioxide emissions. The ships would be unmanned and directed by satellite to locations with the best conditions for increasing cloud cover. They would mainly operate in the Pacific, far enough from land to avoid interfering with rainfall.

The idea has been circulating for a decade but until now has merely been one of many climate engineering pipedreams. A study commissioned by the Copenhagen Consensus Centre, a think-tank that advises governments on how to spend aid money, found that the fleet would cost $9 billion (£5.3 billion) to test and launch within 25 years.

There are ominous signs that the Earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth. The drop in food output could begin quite soon, perhaps only 10 years from now. The regions destined to feel its impact are the great wheat-producing lands of Canada and the U.S.S.R. in the North, along with a number of marginally self- sufficient tropical areas  parts of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indochina and Indonesia  where the growing season is dependent upon the rains brought by the monsoon.

The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it. In England, farmers have seen their growing season decline by about two weeks since 1950, with a resultant overall loss in grain production estimated at up to 100,000 tons annually. During the same time, the average temperature around the equator has risen by a fraction of a degree  a fraction that in some areas can mean drought and desolation. Last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes ever recorded, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people and caused half a billion dollars' worth of damage in 13 U.S. states.

To scientists, these seemingly disparate incidents represent the advance signs of fundamental changes in the world's weather. The central fact is that after three quarters of a century of extraordinarily mild conditions, the earth's climate seems to be cooling down. Meteorologists disagree about the cause and extent of the cooling trend, as well as over its specific impact on local weather conditions. But they are almost unanimous in the view that the trend will reduce agricultural productivity for the rest of the century. If the climatic change is as profound as some of the pessimists fear, the resulting famines could be catastrophic.

"A major climatic change would force economic and social adjustments on a worldwide scale," warns a recent report by the National Academy of Sciences, "because the global patterns of food production and population that have evolved are implicitly dependent on the climate of the present century."

A survey completed last year by Dr. Murray Mitchell of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reveals a drop of half a degree in average ground temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere between 1945 and 1968. According to George Kukla of Columbia University, satellite photos indicated a sudden, large increase in Northern Hemisphere snow cover in the winter of 1971-72. And a study released last month by two NOAA scientists notes that the amount of sunshine reaching the ground in the continental U.S. diminished by 1.3% between 1964 and 1972.

To the layman, the relatively small changes in temperature and sunshine can be highly misleading. Reid Bryson of the University of Wisconsin points out that the Earth's average temperature during the great Ice Ages was only about seven degrees lower than during its warmest eras  and that the present decline has taken the planet about a sixth of the way toward the Ice Age average. Others regard the cooling as a reversion to the "little ice age" conditions that brought bitter winters to much of Europe and northern America between 1600 and 1900  years when the Thames used to freeze so solidly that Londoners roasted oxen on the ice and when iceboats sailed the Hudson River almost as far south as New York City.

Just what causes the onset of major and minor ice ages remains a mystery. "Our knowledge of the mechanisms of climatic change is at least as fragmentary as our data," concedes the National Academy of Sciences report. "Not only are the basic scientific questions largely unanswered, but in many cases we do not yet know enough to pose the key questions."

Meteorologists think that they can forecast the short-term results of the return to the norm of the last century. They begin by noting the slight drop in overall temperature that produces large numbers of pressure centers in the upper atmosphere. These break up the smooth flow of westerly winds over temperate areas. The stagnant air produced in this way causes an increase in extremes of local weather such as droughts, floods, extended dry spells, long freezes, delayed monsoons and even local temperature increases  all of which have a direct impact on food supplies.

"The world's food-producing system," warns Dr. James D. McQuigg of NOAA's Center for Climatic and Environmental Assessment, "is much more sensitive to the weather variable than it was even five years ago." Furthermore, the growth of world population and creation of new national boundaries make it impossible for starving peoples to migrate from their devastated fields, as they did during past famines.

Climatologists are pessimistic that political leaders will take any positive action to compensate for the climatic change, or even to allay its effects. They concede that some of the more spectacular solutions proposed, such as melting the Arctic ice cap by covering it with black soot or diverting arctic rivers, might create problems far greater than those they solve. But the scientists see few signs that government leaders anywhere are even prepared to take the simple measures of stockpiling food or of introducing the variables of climatic uncertainty into economic projections of future food supplies. The longer the planners delay, the more difficult will they find it to cope with climatic change once the results become grim reality.

[. . . the fleet would cost $9 billion (£5.3 billion) to test and launch within 25 years. This is a fraction of the $250 billion that the worlds leading nations are considering spending each year to cut CO2 emissions.]

If it’s a choice between these “cloud ships” and Cap-and-Trade, I vote for the S.S. Rube Goldberg.

7
posted on 08/06/2009 5:10:16 PM PDT
by Brad from Tennessee
(A politician can't give you anything he hasn't first stolen from you.)

Well if you believe contrary to observation that the earth is warming, not due to the Sun, but to greenhouse gases. Why would you want to create machines on a massive scale that emit a compound with some of the most potent heat retaining characteristics known to man? Water vapor holds heat. That’s why virtually all of the power generated by humans are basically from large water heaters.

I guess no one told them that global warming stopped about a decade ago, according to whom you ask, and that the last two years cooling brought us back to the temperature as it was in 1980. Oblivious idiots!

Although sunspot cycle 24 is VERY slow to get underway (decades-long records are being broken for low minimum period activity), over the course of the past 80-100 years sunspot numbers have actually been through the roof (during *peak periods* of the 11-year solar activity cycle throughout this 80-100 yr period). Cycle-24 is not expected to get really busy for a few more years yet, possibly not until around 2013 they're saying now. Will the high level of sunspot activity continue when the peak finally arrives?. We will see. -etl

The following which I pieced together, describes a possible connection between the sunspot/solar activity cycle and climate.

If you look at the chart below, you will see that sunspot activity (during solar maxes--the individual peaks every apprx 11 yrs) has been relatively high since about 1900 and almost non-existent for the period between about 1625 and 1725. This period is known as the Maunder (sunspot) Minimum or "Little Ice Age".-etl

____________________________________________________

From BBC News [yr: 2004]: "A new [2004] analysis shows that the Sun is more active now than it has been at anytime in the previous 1,000 years. Scientists based at the Institute for Astronomy in Zurich used ice cores from Greenland to construct a picture of our star's activity in the past. They say that over the last century the number of sunspots rose at the same time that the Earth's climate became steadily warmer."..."In particular, it has been noted that between about 1645 and 1715, few sunspots were seen on the Sun's surface.

This period is called the Maunder Minimum after the English astronomer who studied it. It coincided with a spell of prolonged cold weather often referred to as the "Little Ice Age". Solar scientists strongly suspect there is a link between the two events - but the exact mechanism remains elusive."http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3869753.stm ____________________________________________________

It's really hard to imagine how this little ball of fire could have any impact on our climate at all. /s

But the main arguments being made for a solar-climate connection is not so much to do with the heat of the Sun (the sun isn't necessarily getting warmer) but rather with its magnetic cycles. When the Sun is more magnetically active (typically around the peak of the 11-year sunspot cycle --we are a few yrs away at the moment), the Sun's magnetic field is better able to deflect away incoming galactic cosmic rays (highly energetic charged particles coming from outside the solar system). The GCRs are thought to help in the formation of low-level cumulus clouds -the type of clouds that BLOCK sunlight and help cool the Earth. So when the Sun's MF is acting up (not like now -the next sunspot max is expected in about 2013, according to the latest predictions), less GCRs reach the Earth's atmosphere, less low level, sunlight-blocking clouds form, and more sunlight gets through to warm the Earth's surface...naturally. Clouds are basically made up of tiny water droplets. When minute particles in the atmosphere become ionized by incoming GCRs they become very 'attractive' to water molecules, in a purely chemical sense of the word. The process by which the Sun's increased magnetic field deflects incoming cosmic rays is very similar to the way magnetic fields steer electrons in a cathode ray tube (old-time television tube) or electrons and other charged particles around the ring of a subatomic particle accelerator.-etl ____________________________________________________

From 2008...

The Center for Sun-Climate Research at the DNSC (Danish National Space Center) investigates the connection between variations in the intensity of cosmic rays and climatic changes on Earth. This field of research has been given the name 'cosmoclimatology'"..."Cosmic ray intensities  and therefore cloudiness  keep changing because the Sun's magnetic field varies in its ability to repel cosmic rays coming from the Galaxy, before they can reach the Earth." :http://www.spacecenter.dk/research/sun-climate ____________________________________________________

From a well-referenced wikipedia.com column (see wiki link for ref 14): "Sunspot numbersover the past 11,400 years have been reconstructed using dendrochronologically dated radiocarbon concentrations. The level of solar activity during the past 70 years is exceptional  the last period of similar magnitude occurred over 8,000 years ago. The Sun was at a similarly high level of magnetic activity for only ~10% of the past 11,400 years, and almost all of the earlier high-activity periods were shorter than the present episode.[14]"

"Reconstruction of solar activity over 11,400 years. Period of equally high activity over 8,000 years ago marked. Present period is on [the right]. Values since 1900 not shown." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation ____________________________________________________

Q-Does the number of sunspots have any effect on the climate here on Earth?

A-Sunspots are slightly cooler areas on the surface of the Sun, due to the intense magnetic fields, so they radiate a little less energy than the surroundings. However, there are usually nearby areas associated with the sunspots that are a little hotter (called falculae), and they more than compensate. The result is that there is a little bit more radiation coming from the Sun when it has more sunspots, but the effect is so small that it has very little impact on the weather and climate on Earth.

However, there are more important indirect effects: sunspots are associated with what we call "active regions", with large magnetic structures containing very hot material (being held in place by the magnetism). This causes more ultraviolet (or UV) radiation (the rays that give you a suntan or sunburn), and extreme ultraviolet radiation (EUV). These types of radiation have an impact on the chemistry of the upper atmosphere (e.g. producing ozone). Since some of these products act as greenhouse gases, the number of sunspots (through association with active regions) may influence the climate in this way.

Many active regions produce giant outflows of material that are called Coronal Mass Ejections. These ejections drag with them some of the more intense magnetic fields that are found in the active regions. The magnetic fields act as a shield for high-energy particles coming from various sources in our galaxy (outside the solar system). These "cosmic rays" (CRs) cause ionization of molecules in the atmosphere, and thereby can cause clouds to form (because the ionized molecules or dust particle can act as "seeds" for drop formation).

If clouds are formed very high in the atmosphere, the net result is a heating of the Earth - it acts as a "blanket" that keeps warmth in.

If clouds are formed lower down in the atmosphere, they reflect sunlight better than they keep heat inside, so the net result is cooling. Which processes are dominant is still a matter of research.

NASA graph of sunspot activity over the past 400 years [note the profound lack of sunspot activity during the "Little Ice Age" period (apprx 1650-1720), AND the sharp INCREASE particularly during the past 60 years:

ScienceDaily (Jun. 7, 2002) HANOVER, N.H. Thanks to new calculations by a Dartmouth geochemist, scientists are now looking at the earth's climate history in a new light. Mukul Sharma, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences at Dartmouth, examined existing sets of geophysical data and noticed something remarkable: the sun's magnetic activity is varying in 100,000-year cycles, a much longer time span than previously thought, and this solar activity, in turn, may likely cause the 100,000-year climate cycles on earth. This research helps scientists understand past climate trends and prepare for future ones.http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/06/020607073439.htm

Many active regions produce giant outflows of material that are called Coronal Mass Ejections. These ejections drag with them some of the more intense magnetic fields that are found in the active regions. The magnetic fields act as a shield for high-energy particles coming from various sources in our galaxy (outside the solar system). These "cosmic rays" (CRs) cause ionization of molecules in the atmosphere, and thereby can cause clouds to form (because the ionized molecules or dust particle can act as "seeds" for drop formation).

If clouds are formed very high in the atmosphere, the net result is a heating of the Earth - it acts as a "blanket" that keeps warmth in.

If clouds are formed lower down in the atmosphere, they reflect sunlight better than they keep heat inside, so the net result is cooling. Which processes are dominant is still a matter of research.

Clouds are liquid water droplets that reflect all wavelengths of light including infrared. They have very different properties than invisible water vapor.

THE ACQUITTAL OF CARBON DIOXIDE by Jeffrey A. Glassman, PhD

ABSTRACT:

"Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere [historically] is the product of oceanic respiration due to the well-known but under-appreciated solubility pump. Carbon dioxide rises out of warm ocean waters where it is added to the atmosphere. There it is mixed with residual and accidental CO2, and circulated, to be absorbed into the sink of the cold ocean waters. Next the thermohaline circulation carries the CO2-rich sea water deep into the ocean. A millennium later it appears at the surface in warm waters, saturated by lower pressure and higher temperature, to be exhausted back into the atmosphere. Throughout the past 420 millennia, comprising four interglacial periods, the Vostok record of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is imprinted with, and fully characterized by, the physics of the solubility of CO2 in water, along with the lag in the deep ocean circulation.

Notwithstanding that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, atmospheric carbon dioxide has neither caused nor amplified global temperature increases. Increased carbon dioxide has been an effect of global warming, not a cause. Technically, carbon dioxide is a lagging proxy for ocean temperatures. When global temperature, and along with it, ocean temperature rises, the physics of solubility causes atmospheric CO2 to increase.

If increases in carbon dioxide, or any other greenhouse gas, could have in turn raised global temperatures, the positive feedback would have been catastrophic. While the conditions for such a catastrophe were present in the Vostok record from natural causes, the runaway event did not occur. Carbon dioxide does not accumulate in the atmosphere."

The graph above represents temperature and CO2 levels over the past 400,000 years. It is the same exact data Al Gore and the rest of the man-made global warmers refer to. The blue line is temps, the red, CO2 levels. The deep valleys represent 4 separate glaciation/ice-age periods. Look carefully at this historical relationship between temps and CO2 levels (the present is on the right hand side of the graph) and keep in mind that Gore claims this data is the 'proof' that CO2 has warmed the earth in the past. But does the data indeed show this? Nope. In fact, rising CO2 levels all throughout this 400,000-year period actually *followed* temperature increases -lagging behind by an average of 800 years! So it couldn't have been CO2 that got Earth out of these past glaciations. Yet Gore continually and dishonestly claims otherwise. Furthermore, the subsequent CO2 level increases due to dissolved CO2 being released from warming oceans, never did lead to additional warming, the so-called "run-away greenhouse effect" that Al Gore and his friends keep warning us about. In short, there is little if any evidence that CO2 had ever led to increased warming, at least not when the levels were within 10-15 times of what they are today. -etl _______________________________________________________________

"The above chart shows the range of global temperature through the last 500 million years. There is no statistical correlation between the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere through the last 500 million years and the temperature record in this interval. In fact, one of the highest levels of carbon dioxide concentration occurred during a major ice age that occurred about 450 million years ago [Myr]. Carbon dioxide concentrations at that time were about 15 times higher than at present." [also see 180 million years ago, same thing happened]:http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=010405M _______________________________________________________________

So, greenhouse [effect] is all about carbon dioxide, right?

Wrong. The most important players on the greenhouse stage are water vapor and clouds [clouds of course aren't gas, but high level ones do act to trap heat from escaping, while low-lying cumulus clouds tend to reflect sunlight and thereby help cool the planet -etl]. Carbon dioxide has been increased to about 0.038% of the atmosphere (possibly from about 0.028% pre-Industrial Revolution) while water in its various forms ranges from 0% to 4% of the atmosphere and its properties vary by what form it is in and even at what altitude it is found in the atmosphere.

In simple terms the bulk of Earth's greenhouse effect is due to water vapor by virtue of its abundance. Water accounts for about 90% of the Earth's greenhouse effect -- perhaps 70% is due to water vapor and about 20% due to clouds (mostly water droplets), some estimates put water as high as 95% of Earth's total tropospheric greenhouse effect (e.g., Freidenreich and Ramaswamy, 'Solar Radiation Absorption by Carbon Dioxide, Overlap with Water, and a Parameterization for General Circulation Models,' Journal of Geophysical Research 98 (1993):7255-7264).

The remaining portion comes from carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, methane, ozone and miscellaneous other 'minor greenhouse gases.' As an example of the relative importance of water it should be noted that changes in the relative humidity on the order of 1.3-4% are equivalent to the effect of doubling CO2.

Water vapor constitutes Earth's most significant greenhouse gas, accounting for about 95% of Earth's greenhouse effect (4). Interestingly, many 'facts and figures' regarding global warming completely ignore the powerful effects of water vapor in the greenhouse system, carelessly (perhaps, deliberately) overstating human impacts as much as 20-fold.

Water vapor is 99.999% of natural origin. Other atmospheric greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and miscellaneous other gases (CFC's, etc.), are also mostly of natural origin (except for the latter, which is mostly anthropogenic).

Human activities contribute slightly to greenhouse gas concentrations through farming, manufacturing, power generation, and transportation. However, these emissions are so dwarfed in comparison to emissions from natural sources we can do nothing about, that even the most costly efforts to limit human emissions would have a very small-- perhaps undetectable-- effect on global climate.

ScienceDaily (Nov. 18, 2008)  Water vapor is known to be Earth's most abundant greenhouse gas, but the extent of its contribution to global warming has been debated. Using recent NASA satellite data, researchers have estimated more precisely than ever the heat-trapping effect of water in the air, validating the role of the gas as a critical component of climate change.

Most clouds exist below where jets fly and have a powerful cooling effect during the day, blanketing effect at night. We can't control the Sun but we can influence Earth's natural iris cost effectively. Global warmongers hate this subject and always say we know little about clouds.

26
posted on 08/06/2009 5:49:29 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

The fleet would cost $9 billion (£5.3 billion) to test and launch within 25 years. This is a fraction of the $250 billion that the worlds leading nations are considering spending each year to cut CO2 emissions.

The American tax payers will pay for this wave and fountain show, so it doesn't matter what the cost is.

So a clear winter’s night is just as warm as a cloudy one. Yeah right. The clouds hold in the heat. Like I said. They don’t block all wavelengths either. I’m not sure where you get your info from but a person can get sunburned on a cloudy day.

This is an engineering solution rather than a tax and regulate scheme. Most engineers are conservatives. We couldn’t supply 7 billion people on Earth with food and freshwater without geo-engineering schemes.

29
posted on 08/06/2009 5:55:14 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

The morning after a clear winter night is colder than a cloudy one because the surface heat radiates out to space. Whether clouds have a net warming or cooling effect has more to do with their thickness than their altitude. Clouds are Earth’s iris and are the most significant factor in how much solar energy originally enters the oceans and climate. Human activity already influences them.

33
posted on 08/06/2009 6:08:15 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

The heat radiates out because the clouds aren’t retaining the surface heat. Clouds during the day don’t block all the radiation but do, just as during the night, retain the longer wavelengths such as infrared/heat. They also reflect a lot of radio frequencies for the same reason.

The heat radiates out because the clouds arent retaining the surface heat.

Clouds reflect the surface heat back down, and sunshine back up. It does not matter to the surface what the heat content of a cloud is, only it's thickness and altitude. Blankets don't keep you warm by being warm, but by reflecting your own heat back at you. Due to its inefficiency, a blanket becomes slightly warm from your heat loss, but that has no influence on how warm it keeps you.

36
posted on 08/06/2009 6:33:09 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

Because clouds are reflective they can be used at night to retain heat. Farmer’s used to use smudge pots to create man-made cloud blankets that kept citrus trees from freezing. Clouds can be influenced to swing the surface temperature either direction. We can prevent an ice age or global warming with cloud control. We can’t influence the Sun, but we can influence clouds.

37
posted on 08/06/2009 6:40:19 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

This not complicated. The higher energy wavelengths penetrate the cloud cover. The lower energy, longer wavelengths do not penetrate as easily. The higher energies penetrate, interact with surface materials and radiate lower energies such as the color spectrum or infrared. These are blocked by the clouds and absorbed by ambient atmospheric moisture. The heat is retained on the earth's surface for that reason. Deserts often vary widely in night and daytime surface temperature for this reason. The water vapor holds the heat. That's why when we build a coal or nuclear plant they are run on steam. Water's ability to store heat energy is converted to mechanical energy through turbines.

Clouds are poor reflectors of radio frequencies. Radar cannot see a cloud, but can see precipitation. On the other hand thick clouds are strong reflectors of infrared heat. Almost all of the heat in a cloud originally came from the surface at the time the water evaporated. Clouds absorb very little new heat from the surface once they are up there.

43
posted on 08/06/2009 7:00:20 PM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

I've used cloud cover in fleet communications. The fleet I ran would sometimes double it's effective communication area with the right cloud cover. If you think clouds don’t maintain heat, even though any observant individual can walk out on a few nights and see for themselves, I don't know what to say. Read up on it. I'm not responding anymore here.

Farmers used to use smudge pots to create man-made cloud blankets that kept citrus trees from freezing.

Smudge pots produce heat which helps to keep citrus from freezing. The smoke is pretty much gone once the pot is 'primed'. After it gets about 29 or 30 degrees F, they don't work. (former Florida Citrus Belt resident)

I don't have personal experience with smudge pots but had read about the man-made cloud blanket effect long ago. Here is an entry at Encyclopedia Britannica: smudge pot device - usually an oil container with some crude oil burning in the bottom, used in fruit orchards, especially citrus groves, to provide protection against frost. The smoke serves as a blanket to reduce heat losses due to outgoing radiation. Because of the air pollution they generate smudge pots have been generally supplanted by other means of frost protection, such as smokeless burners using natural gas.

50
posted on 08/07/2009 3:48:46 AM PDT
by Reeses
(Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)

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